KNOXVILLE — The co-owner of a nightclub near the University of Tennessee campus said “seven to 10” Volunteers football players were involved in a fight early Friday morning at the establishment.

Knoxville Police Department officials were on scene at the incident, but none offered comment on the situation — including whether any arrests were made.

UT spokespeople were gathering information on the incident and also weren’t ready to comment.

Bar Knoxville co-owner Sandy Morton offered her eyewitness account of the event to the Times Free Press.

Morton said the fight started inside but spread outside, and it ended with an off-duty police officer knocked unconscious in Cumberland Avenue.

“Basically, it was a normal Thursday night — Thursday’s our big night,” Morton said. “We had all the UT football players come in. They’re on a first-name basis with my husband (and co-owner), and they get VIP status, which means they pay no cover at the door. We’ve never had a problem with them in the past, but tonight, apparently they had a falling out with another gentleman. I don’t know why. I don’t know what happened, but several of the guys started beating up the other customer. I want to guess there was seven to 10 guys beating up this one gentleman.

“All the security then rushed in and were trying to break it up. My husband saw them picking up bar stools and starting to swing them. We got them out the door with security. There happened to be a friend of ours who was an off-duty police officer outside. He tried to help, and he ended up getting knocked out in the street and proceeded to be kicked while he was down on the ground in the middle of Cumberland.

“That’s basically the gist of it.”

Morton said she interviewed several witnesses but hadn’t determined what started the fight.

“All they said was these several gentlemen just started beating the tar out of this one,” she said. “There was blood. There was ripped shirts. It took pretty much all my security to get them out.”

Morton said her establishment has had some “small” problems with UT football players in the past.

“We have a strict dress code, and they’ll try to cross the line as much as they can,” she said. “They’ll try to come in without ID, but we’re very strict on ID. We’re very strict on underage drinking. We’ve had small occasions where we’ve had to throw a couple of them out for underage drinking. An overage friend will buy them a drink.

“That’s the typical problems we’ve had, but we’ve never had a fight. This is our first, and it will be our last.”

The Times Free Press will continue following this developing story.

Other contacts for Wes Rucker are www.twitter.com/wesrucker and www.facebook.com/tfpvolsbeat.

Is that NCAA legal?